


you held a warm stone out new flowing blood to hold

by electricshoop



Series: The Art of Losing Oneself While Trying to Be Found (And Other Grand Escape Plans) [4]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: (all within what's canon), (in which the author is delighted because they got to experiment with writing styles), Discussion of death/dying, Hospitals, Mentions of Cancer, Other, POV Alternating, POV Second Person, POV Third Person, Spiral!Gerry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-27 01:16:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21110297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricshoop/pseuds/electricshoop
Summary: There's a door inside his hospital room, and it's black, and he thinks, "Funeral door," and it would be funny, really, if he wasn't so fucking scared.*(Not that you'd ever tell him that, but you don't actually think your patron liked it much, your offer to save his life.)





	you held a warm stone out new flowing blood to hold

**Author's Note:**

> hello, look at me, providing regular updates! (let's hope that doesn't jinx it.)  
this is the 4th installment of this series, so by now, you really may want to start reading [from the beginning](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20668922), just for Context
> 
> [title taken from "Pink Bullets" by The Shins]

the person in front of you is clutching their notepad to their chest. they're staring at you, their eyes wide and full of fear.

good.

"i must confess," you say, choosing your words carefully, "that i am not quite certain how it works. he refuses to take people, and i am unsure if that's going to be a problem. i do not want it to become a problem."

they're still just staring at you. silently watching. it reminds you of him, in a way - he likes to watch, as well, still clinging to that part which was so fond of the Eye. still is, perhaps. is that part of the problem? you don't know. you frown a little. "it might be," you say.

your victim blinks once, confused, then flinches - the sound of soft sobbing coming from a room somewhere to your left, muffled only by the closed door. (the room behind it is empty, but the person standing in front of you does not know that; they only know that this voice is familiar; that it is the voice of somebody they couldn't help; that they failed to do their job correctly. you know all that, but it doesn't matter to you; you do not care why this right here is where they belong, why this is what they fear enough for it to haunt their nightmares.)

"am i- dreaming?" they finally blurt out, eyes fixated on the closed door.

you make a noncommittal sound. "yes ... and no. you are, but you will not be waking up."

they look like they are about to cry, and you sigh. you have no time for this. "you are not dead," you say, because you think that might be the next question - this is what humans are so often concerned with, as if death was the only-

oh.

"he would have died," you say. "so i really do not think he should complain. he did not want to die - you people never do."

(you did not want him to die either, but that's entirely irrelevant, here.)

(it felt good, laying your patron's claim on him, ripping him right out from under the gaze of the Eye, this power- 

entirely irrelevant, here.)

finally, they tear their eyes away from the door, the one with the sobbing, and look at you instead. "who ... who are you even talking about?"

"the assistant who is not her assistant anymore," you say, readily delivering the explanation. "... gerard." he wanted to be called that, you remind yourself.

(or, no, at first he wanted to be called the other name, the one for his friends, but things have changed, now, and he doesn't want to be called gerard, but he does want to not be called her assistant, so.)

"he's not unlike me, now. just ... different."

they nod, even though you doubt they understand. (how could they?) you almost respect them for that. 

"i told him he has to take people - that this is how it works - but he refuses. he says i cannot make him. he might be right. i haven't tried, but i do not think i want to make him do anything. he would be upset with me. i do not think i like it, when he's upset with me."

"you- you want him to- to take people," they say, slowly, as if trying to piece together tiny pictures into something bigger, more complicated. 

"like i took you," you offer as an explanation. they don't seem to like that much.

"why- why _did _you take me?"

"you are scared," you say, and they stare and say nothing, and you shake your head. "none of your concern, do not worry about it." another second passes, and you frown a little at them. "i will leave you now." you had told the not-anymore-assistant that you're not in the habit of talking to others. a truth, simple and straightforward (the thought doesn't sit quite right, but then, you are truthful with him rather often.) you don't want to start talking now; you can't see a reason to do that.

they look around, a little hectic - frightened, perhaps, about the prospect of being left alone with the sound of too-familiar voices crying. 

"and, er, and, and, why do you want gerard to take people?"

you pause, already half turned away.

"that is just how it works."

"how what works?" they inquire, with no hesitation, still sounding frantic.

you sigh and turn back and sit down.

(they stare. the chair wasn't there half a second before. it's not really there now, you don't think, but you keep sitting in it anyway.)

"well, she lied to him, of course. she's exceptionally skilled at that, considering everything she is supposed to be."

(others might argue about this definition of "lying" - she simply didn't say anything. close enough for you. and if you know anything at all, then it is lies.)

"and- and now he has to, er, take people?"

"that is how it works," you confirm again. "that is what he is, now. i believe he might not be used to it, yet. i think i was used to it more quickly, but i do not remember it clearly. perhaps it was more upsetting for him than it was for me, becoming something else, because he is still gerard, and i am not michael anymore."

they look confused, look like they're trying to catch up. "and- okay, yes, and- how did he ... _become _what he is now?" your victim slowly sits down too; sinks into an almost-existent chair. (they look scared still, but there's something else right beside it, now. curiosity, perhaps.) they're still hugging their notebook as you keep talking. 

*

for a few moments, after waking up (he’s not sure that’s the right word for what’s happening, but he can’t think of a more fitting one), he doesn’t remember his name. he prides himself on being scared of very little by now (this thought feels ironic, for reasons he can’t quite grasp yet), but this revelation_ (i don’t know my own name and i don't know where i am and how i got here and what time it is what year what existence)_ lets a wave of pure terror wash over him. he crouches down and breathes, slowly and deliberately. it helps. he’s staring at a scratchy-looking carpet, mustard-yellow. he doesn’t remember this carpet. he breathes. it helps. then he looks up. the wallpaper is also yellow. something tells him that this is hilarious.

it wasn’t yellow before. was it?

it was … no. it was white. sterile.

there’s nothing behind the wallpaper. there might be, though. actually, yeah. who knows. who knows, when dealing with michael. the Spiral. the Distortion. (it is lies, it is not what it is. this right here is yellow wallpaper, and a room he doesn't recognize, and a body he inhabits but that feels foreign to him right now. there is no pain, and part of him tells him that this is what feels off, just for the moment; surely that will change; bodies aren't supposed to be in pain; this right here is yellow wallpaper, and-)

-one second. there's- 

Michael. yes.

he closes his eyes, takes another deep breath.

gerry.

He’s Gerry. That’s his name; the one he prefers, the one he’s used for himself since he was 11 or 12, in the beginning to spite his mom, even though the sentiment had been vague; not quite within his reach just yet. Then because it felt right. (Perhaps in part because there had always been a shadow of a trace of a memory; his father calling him that.)

Doesn't matter now. He knows his name. He can work with that. He slowly stands upright again, leans against the wall, and thinks. Yellow wallpaper. Because Michael is bloody hilarious. Michael brought him here; brought him here from the other place, the one with the white, sterile walls- a hospital room.

He was in a hospital, because-

Ah.

He grimaces. _Shit. _

Gerry closes his eyes and gives it time, tries to let the memories come back slowly, stops trying to force them back all at once. 

_(he gives a shrug, and then he looks at michael for a few long seconds, and then says, "i don't think i've ever felt home anywhere," and he's in a hotel room, of course, and maybe he is drunk, and maybe he's holding michael's hand, and maybe he doesn't know how this happened, or who took whose hand, but michael's skin feels a little wrong and very warm, and not at all like it could slice open his skin.)_

... He almost died. He should have died. 

_(and michael looks confused, and gerry thinks, it is nice, being able to confuse a servant of the most confusing Fear, and then michael says, "but you have a home. a place where you live," and_

_(he gives a shrug, and then he looks at michael for a few long seconds, and then says, "i do, i suppose. still got the key to the bookshop. but i haven't been there properly in months, and-" he trails off for a while and just holds michael's hand. it holds his in return. "... there's people who say that home's more of a feeling than a place, y'know?" he looks down at their hands, and michael makes "hmm," and then says, "no, i don't think i know that." and gerry smiles and shakes his head and says, "not important," and it really isn't, because he's drunk, and also holding michael's hand-))_

focus, damn it. Focus. He needs to- 

He doesn't actually know where the thoughts came from; why these memories, why now, why here. They're his, he knows that, but they don't feel like his own either way.

He needs to focus: He almost died. He should have died.

Brain tumor, Gertrude had said; had announced it to the nurses, with cruel casualness; she'd known. She'd … _Known_, most likely. And hadn't told him. Something in his chest clenches painfully, and he bites his lip, hard, because like hell is he going to cry about this now. He's alive, after all. He's alive, because-

*

She stays with him, for some of the time. She's sat by his side, next to his bed, in a chair that doesn't look comfortable to sit in, and she's looking at him, quietly; she hardly takes her eyes off him. Neither of them speaks. Gerry can't find the energy; everything is pain and heaviness and the smell of disinfectant and the sound of hospital machines and he thinks of Giger and-

-and the thought slips away, and he blinks at Gertrude again, eyelids heavy heavy heavy, and she's looking right back, and he realizes that he wouldn't speak even if he had the energy. He's too exhausted to be properly angry, but the emotion is still there, lingering, out of reach but active, and he's-

-he's so, so angry at her, and at himself, because he's disappointed and surprised, and he shouldn't be; none of this should have come as a surprise, and-

-and at some point, she leaves, after telling him she'll be back.

He doesn't know how much time passes; a nurse comes into his room for a few ... minutes(? probably), fiddles with something, then leaves again, gives him a tired little smile, and maybe it's pity, and maybe he hates her a little bit, and maybe he really, really doesn't want to be alone.

Maybe he's really, really scared.

There's no reason to turn his head. It's hard, costs energy that he doesn't really have - but he does it anyway, turns his head and looks at the wall and ... a door. There's a door; a rectangle shape against the wall that should be only separating his room from the next. Black wood.

_Funeral door,_ he thinks, amused, almost. 

"Michael?" he tries to say, and says something that sounds approximately like it. His lips are very dry, and speaking hurts, and everything hurts.

It takes a few moments for the door to be pushed open.

"Hello, assistant," Michael says, and smiles at him. Gerry isn't sure if he's ever seen Michael smile so sincerely before. (Still headache-inducing. _(Or it's the fucking brain tumor, who knows.)_)

It steps closer, slowly, and looks at him very intently, studies his face. "You are dying," it then announces, matter-of-factly.

"Mm. Sure am," he mumbles.

"Are you scared?" 

Michael sounds curious, and Gerry would laugh if the answer wasn't a resounding _yes!_, because of course - of course that's the question it asks.

He simply nods, and Michael mirrors the gesture. "If I was on better terms with the End," it says, almost dreamily, "I would try to convince it to play a game of chess against you."

Gerry snorts, and part of him feels incredibly warm, because Michael is here, and because Michael manages to chase away at least part of the fear and replace it with amusement. 

He shakes his head and says, "UNO." His voice is weak and everything is so heavy and he's not sure Michael actually heard him, but he really doesn't want to play chess against Death - he's sure they've done that thousands of times by now and must be much more skilled than he is.

Time passes, measured by the soft beeping sound of his pulse (that will stop at some point; soon, and then- what's then? How has he never asked himself what comes after- He doesn't think he believes in God, he doesn't think he wants to; he knows what exists - that terrible, unspeakable, God-like forces exist, and he thinks of his mother, and he thinks of his mother, and- and-)

"Would you? Play against it? To save your life?"

Michael's voice is still so matter-of-factly that the sobriety, the _(heaviness) _force with which it poses the question clashes violently with the tone and catches him off guard. It shouldn't be able to sound both casual and serious, nobody should be able to do that, but this is Michael. Michael.

And he, of course, knows the answer, and he doesn't hesitate as he simply nods again.

He really, really doesn't want to die.

He doesn't want to die. Not here, not now, not like this; that's not the kind of end he wants. Stories are all about the ending, and that right here isn't his. That's not how it's supposed to go - people who deal with the supernatural and looming apocalypses don't die like this, in a hospital bed, observed by a woman who refused to tell them they're dying, surrounded by strangers coming and going, the disgustingly clean hospital smell in their nose, thinking about a mother that never loved them in ways that made sense, that's not what such people- that's now what he _deserves_. He'd rather die by the hand of some unspeakable, lovecraftian terror.

Michael keeps looking at him. Gerry's pulse keeps counting the seconds. 

"I thought about it," it says. "I can help," it says. "I could help," it says.

"Wh-"

He falls quiet when Michael takes a step to one side and reveals a door, a new one. It seems to be flickering, just slightly. It's plain wood, unpainted, and Gerry doesn't understand-

"I do not know if you want me to help in that way." Again so matter-of-factly, and Gerry-

Gerry understands.

He stares at the door. It's flickering.

He doesn't want to die.

The door is flickering.

Michael is waiting for a reaction, he thinks.

He thinks-

He doesn't want to die; he's scared, he's terrified, in an unbearably numb way-

"Yes," he whispers, "okay."

Michael doesn't blink, and it's voice is as unemotional as ever, but its eyes are kind on him. "I am afraid, assistant, that is a very vague answer to a question with very severe results." Beat. "You would not be ... the same."

Gerry wants to roll his eyes, wants to tell it, _Yes, obviously, I'm dying, not stupid,_ wants to scream, because he knows, _of course_ he knows; he's heard a dozen different tales, dozens of times; all the monster origin stories, nightmares-turned-reality, losing-oneself, the promise of love-love-love, overwhelming fear-and-terror, a sense of peace-maybe-for-the-first-time, and finding-home-home-home, he knows, he knows all this, he wants to glare at Michael, wants to tell it-

He nods again.

"I know," he gets out, somehow, and he's so angry, so frustrated, but his voice sounds like tears. "Just- yeah, okay, _help_. I don't- don't want to die, Michael."

Michael is suddenly so good at watching; it's still looking at him. "Are you sure? Your connection to-"

And Gerry has never cared less about the Beholding or whatever lukewarm connection they might share, because he's feeling watched, like he always is, just a little, because he's not all too interesting; just interesting enough to let him die in a fucking hospital bed in a city that isn't his own, on a continent that isn't his own, and he reaches out and grabs Michael's hand. The gesture is only vaguely gentle. "'m sure. Michael ... please. ... Please don't make me ask you a third time, _please_."

Michael looks down, looks at Gerry's hand, and then back at its door, and then it nods, and somehow Gerry manages to stand - he's not sure how, everything is still so heavy, everything is still sharp-numb pain, but Michael's hand is steady, and Michael's arm is steady, steadying, is wrapped around him, he thinks, and the door is flickering, and his surroundings are blurry, and that might be the door, might be _the fucking brain tumor, who knows,_ and he knows that he touches the door knob, knows that Michael doesn't do anything, knows that he's the one pulling the door open, knows-

nothing, then.

*

He exhales slowly. "Okay," he whispers. "Okay, that's ..."

That's the feeling of vague panic inside his chest and stomach and entire body. No pain. The pain is gone, and so is the heaviness. He takes another look around. Yellow wallpaper. He doesn't know where he is, and he's not sure he dares to check - there is a door, he realizes now, but he's not sure he wants to open it.

Just a heartbeat later, it's being pushed open. There's soft creaking, filling the room, echoing off the walls, spiraling back, seeping into the door-

"Hello, assistant," Michael says, and it smiles at him, and it looks- right. (No, no, not quite, it's still all wrong, the angels are wrong, and a smile shouldn't have that many angles to begin with, anyway, but-) -it looks right, exactly like it's supposed to look.

"Hey, Michael," Gerry says slowly. 

"Do you remember?"

He nods.

"Good." 

Gerry fights down the panic - it's easier than he thinks it should be. "You saved my life," he says. The words taste like surprise on his lips.

Michael hums. "You said I told you I would keep saving your life," it responds simply.

Part of Gerry wants to laugh at that, but his brain is quicker than that, remembers the context of Michael's promise, and then everything hurts, just for a moment. "... Until I realize that Gertrude doesn't care about me, you'd said," he answers quietly. "... Think she made that pretty clear. ... You still saved my life. I-"

Michael looks like it wants to say something, or a few things, but it doesn't; it stays silent.

"-thank you."

It nods, and then says, "I like your tattoos better, now."

That comment gives him pause, and he frowns down at his knuckles. 

The tattoos are still there, but the small eyes are - they're distorted, warped, blurred in places. He stares at them and doesn't know what to say, and it's not panic that he's feeling now - that emotion is gone completely - but something else, something he doesn't know what to do with, and he thinks there'd be more intelligent things to say or ask, almost certainly, but what comes out of his mouth is, "Will they ... stay like this, now?"

Michael makes a sound, _I don't know, why do you think I'd know? _Which, yes, alright, fair enough. That's the whole point of the Spiral.

The whole point of the Spiral. The feeling in his stomach is cold. "Michael?"

"Yes, assistant?"

"... I- I think I'd like to take a nap now."

"I am not sure sleep works, in here," Michael says, and sounds like this is the very first time it contemplates this question itself, and Gerry remembers how it had told him that it doesn't sleep, remembers talking it into sitting next to him on the narrow hotel bed, the mattress too hard, remembers looking at it and thinking, _huh, that's almost an entire fanfiction trope._

He shakes his head. "I'd really like a nap," he repeats, and Michael narrows its eyes 

(not angry, Gerry thinks - concerned, perhaps?)

and then nods, and then there's a door, a second one, and behind it a room, and a bed, and Gerry lies down, and he doesn't know if he sleeps, but he closes his eyes and stops thinking.

*

Sometimes he spends what must be hours staring at his tattoos. The way the shapes distort, blur, go back to their original state just for a second or two, and then it all starts anew. He 

_(thinks it's fascinating, the twisting, twisting,)_

hates it, this constant reminder that- He doesn't even have a word for it, doesn't know what's different. He's different. He knows. His hands look normal, though. No sharp blades, no potential for them to be lethal weapons. There's corridors.

_(his)_

Michael's corridors.

_(mine, mine as well; ours?)_

"I ... am not sure what has changed, Michael," he says. 

"You belong here, now," it says. "You belong to these corridors the same way I do, and they belong to you the same way they belong to me, the same way we belong to them."

It makes sense, and doesn't.

He's- He's part of the Spiral, now. He knows, he knows that. He Knows. _(No, that's not- He knows. knows. The Knowing is for others.)_

He feels lost, he thinks. Lost inside _(his)_ these corridors. He watches Michael come and go, it leaves, returns, leaves again. (It never leaves him for too long. Gerry wonders if it feels like it has to babysit him. (But he doesn't ask, he can't; he's not sure he wants to know the answer.)) _(they're your corridors, yours, they belong to you, they're mine-)_

"I feel lost," he says, "and I don't know where to go."

Michael shrugs with one shoulder, casually, as if they were talking about the weather. (Sometimes it's rainy, inside the corridor, and whenever it is, Michael looks at him as if it was his fault. (Christ, maybe it is. Maybe the weather functions as a mood ring, fuck if he knows.)) "Wherever you want to go," it says.

Gerry says nothing.

"Your problem is not that you are lost," it says, "it is that you want to be found. That is not how this place works."

Gerry sighs and sits down. The carpet is rusty red and soft, and he rubs his hands over the surface, again and again. "How does it work, then? It's- Not- Not all of the ... Spiral- _creatures _are like you. There's others, without corridors, without doors. Right?"

Michael looks at him for a long moment, and then says, "Like us. Not all of them are like us, assistant."

Gerry feels judged, and he doesn't like it, and he glares at the carpet. "Will you ever answer _any _of my questions?" It might come out a little more aggressive than anticipated. He bites his lip, and there's an apology sitting somewhere square inside his throat, sitting there like a cotton ball, annoying, making breathing a little harder, but he doesn't quite get it over his lips.

"You do not ask the right questions," Michael says. There's a soft edge to its voice now, too. "And most of the right ones don't have answers. You are here, just like I am, and this is what we do, and you can go wherever you want."

Gerry blinks up at it. It's standing next to him, back leaned against the wall, and it makes his eyes hurt for a second, because Michael seems to blur and blur and blur until its back is the wall and the wall is its back, and then he blinks again, and everything is back to normal, and he might have just imagined it. "Can I ... will doors into existence, now? I don't know how to ... do that."

"Have you tried?" Michael asks, and sounds impossibly smug, because of course it knows the answer already. These are _(their)_ its corridors - it makes sense, he supposes, that it knows about the things that are happening here.

"No," Gerry says, pointedly, "because I don't know how. How do you do it?"

Michael shrugs. It grins down at him. "I have no idea, assistant."

Gerry glares some more, first at Michael, then at the carpet again, and the worst thing is that he's sure that it's telling the truth. "How helpful," he bites out, and Michael laughs, and the sound is a melody is a song is an entire symphony that bounces off the walls and back and-

And then it just leaves; leaves him alone in the corridor with, frankly, hideous wallpaper - not yellow, not this time, but instead it looks like somebody has plastered an 80ies arcade carpet on it, and honestly, that's not much better, and he sighs and gets up and-

"Oh, _son of a_-"

All of the doors are gone.

"Michael," Gerry says, presses the name out between gritted teeth. "Michael, that's not funny. Michael! You can't fucking trap me here, I'm not one of your-"

The word _victims _dies on his tongue, and he quickly swallows it; doesn't want to think about that part at all, because he doesn't know if- If he's supposed to-

"Michael, come on. Let me out of here."

Nothing. Nothing and nothing and nothing and complete and utter silence. Gerry groans in frustration and starts walking down the hallway. The doors, however, are gone, and stay gone, and so does Michael, and Gerry- Gerry isn't scared (he doesn't think he's been properly scared a single time since-), but he finds it frustrating, and he gets angry, and he curses Michael and hopes it can hear it.

He's not sure why this makes him so angry - he's not sure his reaction is entirely reasonable, and he's ready to admit that, but there's also nothing he can do about it; the feeling seems overwhelming. 

There's other things he's not sure about.

He's not sure he considered all the implications of- of this, of what this is, what he is-

Not until he just referred to the others serving the Spiral as _Spiral creatures,_ creatures, and he'd kept himself from using the word _monster _at the last moment, and Michael hadn't seemed pleased, had promptly included him in its statement, and-

And he stares down at his knuckles, and the tattoos aren't any shape he knows or could stick a name to, and he _(finds it so fascinating)_ hates it, hates it, and here's another thing he's not sure about:

He's not sure he wants this, wanted this, and shouldn't Michael have known, master of lies that it is?

The anger is red-hot-burning and ice cold in his stomach, and he thinks he stops walking, and he look at the wall, and 

a door and  
a door and  
a door and  
a d  
there's a door. 

He's so surprised that he forgets all about his anger. It's small, narrow; he thinks he'd have to squeeze through, but it's a comfortable, black square against the loud, neon wallpaper, and he can't stop looking at it, and it takes him a while to realize that he's smiling (and he doesn't know why-) He slowly walks over and touches his hand against it. It's solid, doesn't waver, doesn't flicker. It feels warm against his fingertips, and he opens it, and he steps through it _(and he's almost _giddy_, for a split second he feels whole complete painfully accurate an impossible three-dimensional fractal in a world full of crude drawings of one-dimensional shapes, and the sensation floods his entire body being thinking and it's almost too much; overwhelming) _and finds himself standing in front of a park bench. It's painted a rich, dark green. The paint is chipped off in places, revealing the light brown wood underneath. There's trees, left and right and - and everywhere, really. 

Gerry takes a long, long moment to look about the place, but he has no idea where he is; can't even begin to figure it out. 

In the end, he simply sits down.

(It doesn't matter, where he is.)

He stares down at his knuckles, then over at the door, standing there in the middle of a forest, looking _(as if it'd always been there; as if it'd always belonged here)_ utterly out of place. "... I'm still not sure if this is what I want," he says quietly. "What I wanted." He's not sure Michael can hear him. There's so many things he isn't sure of.

... But still: Just sitting here, the wind on his skin, the- _(his his his)_ -his door right there - it's not bad. Enough for know, perhaps.

(And if someone asked him how he did that; how he willed the door into existence, he, of course, wouldn't know how to answer.)

*

"i ... see," they say. they frown a little, look down at their notebook. they have lost their pen, somewhere, and look like they wish they had taken some notes.

you stare at them, expectantly. you don't know what it is you're expecting, but you talked so much, and it feels like it's their turn, now.

"it ... sounds like he's a little overwhelmed with the entire situation, don't you think?"

you shrug. probably, yes. "he wanted it," you say. "i believe he likes the doors and the corridors, now. but-"

"you want him to, uhh, take people," they interrupt you, and cringe a little. "yes. that ... might be ... a problem for him? mo-morally, i mean."

they flinch when you laugh, and they look scared again, and you think, 

good.

"that is," you say slowly, "how it works." just in case they forgot you told them that already.

they stare at the empty page of their notebook. "that- that doesn't mean he likes it. or, or can do it with no problems whatsoever. have you, er, openly talked about your concerns with him?"

... ha.

"no."

"maybe you should do th-"

"no."

"oh."

"yes."

"why ... not? i, i've often found that open communication-"

you shake your head, "i really do not think that would be a good idea. first, we are now both personifications of the concept of confusion, and second, if i'd do that, he'd try to talk about "what we are" again, and i do not like that, because it makes me nerv-" you abruptly cut yourself off when you see their eyes light up.

ohh. oh, you don't like that.

"... ah. you haven't mentioned that he'd tried to, um, talk about your ... re...lationhip? before, that's-"

you stand, quickly, and glare at them. "i do not like the kind of conversation you try to entangle me in, and i will leave you now, and you will be alone."

(incredibly crude.

you don't care much, and leave them alone in the room.)

**Author's Note:**

> ... honestly, i never intended to make michael so Lowkey Soft, but i guess it's just a Pining Idiot now (and why not; canon is full of them too, after all)  
(michael has also definitely no idea that it basically had a therapy session.)
> 
> i'm [on tumblr](https://electricshoop.tumblr.com)!


End file.
